Mobile Apps and Location Based Marketing for Destinations

Problem

Mobile apps are on lockdown. Many organizations sought native or hybrid mobile apps because it was the new thing to do. However, soon updates became not only costly, but also time consuming in AppStore and GooglePlay approval procedures.

Benefits

By focusing on delivering a tuned CMS for a market, we can tailor solutions to a B2B2C relationship for agencies, marketers and clients. Organizations can manage their mobile apps in real time, providing push content and instant updates to connected devices. This works for anything from simple posts to real time polls, surveys and raffles. This approach significantly reduces mobile app development costs, and allows owners to manage their content independent of publish updates to the AppStore and GooglePlay. And do it instantly.

Minute7, Inc.

QuickBooks Time and Expense Tracking in the Cloud

Minute7 is a cloud based QuickBooks Time Tracker replacement enabling employees or vendors to enter time and expenses from their desktops and mobile devices.

Problem

No one likes to do timesheets, particularly the bookkeeper when they come logged in Excel. Being a stickler for my client’s budgets, I was that bookkeeper for ZLC, and suddenly found myself copying/pasting hundreds of entries into QuickBooks every month for invoicing. I needed a more efficient way for my contractors and employees to enter time and expenses. I needed a web-based time entry app that could sync with a desktop version of QuickBooks. So we built it.

Solution

Digging through Intuit’s documentation for QuickBooks, I found that it was possible to sync via an XML Gateway API. I directed my developers to build a solution. Requirements: It had to be user friendly, reliable and secure. I demonstrated the app to a colleague and we were convinced there was room for us in the industry. We started selling Minute7: QuickBooks Time and Expense Tracking.

Benefits

We made it simple. Just $4 per user, per month. There are no signup, setup, software, hardware, download or update costs. One can sign up for a free trial and cancel at any time with no obligations. There is no impact on QuickBooks data if one cancels.

Results

Featured in Entrepreneur Magazine’s December 2010 issue, just three years after development started, we experienced a surge in growth due to Intuit’s decision to discontinue their Time and Billing Manager app. Thousands of customers were evicted and sought third party providers, Minute7 was ready and earned over a thousand new customers in one quarter alone. We continued onboarding an average of 100 new customers every month. An app built for an in-house idea went from $0 to $25,000 a month. I decided to cash out and sell Minute7 to my partner in 2014 to pursue my new startup project, Joinify.